You drive down my street, speed no consideration.
I have seen you behind the wheel, yes behind the wheel, phone in one hand beverage in the other.
The strength and control that your legs must have, given the task of controlling that run away vehicle.
And the morning I first heard you coming, then saw you in the distance, motorcycle in hand, one wheel up in the air as you roared past me.
I looked at you in disbelief.
You stared back defiantly, annoyingly.
There was the day, not atypical at all, that you sped by and only slowed slightly for the stop sign on our corner.
It was an inconvenience to you, not necessary to say the least.
Was there a hope and prayer in your mind as you drove through,
or was it that you just didn’t care?
Damned be any one or thing that might be coming the other way.
You show yourself again to me and although your speed was great and face partially hidden, I recognized you.
There you were again exercising that undeniable freedom to be you;
no restraints, no accountability to anything or anyone.
How dare you, I thought.
You in all your glory, expressing your inalienable right to endanger yourself and us all.
Action without responsibility, good sense, or any shred of decency.
You, who I know well and have seen so many times.
Is it freedom that you rely on when in fact there is little else?
Do you know in your heart or when reflected back that you have missed out?
A self-dissatisfaction that you cover with bluster and attitude.
A smallness that is successfully hidden in the speed and recklessness that you create,
the truth, common sense, and wisdom that you refuse to see,
be damned the laws that are forced on you.
The imposed cautions and restrictions on your behavior.
How dare they?
“This is my country”, you say, “I am an American,
rightfully entitled.”
And who told you this?
Was it a parent who passed along this misunderstanding?
Perhaps a rebelliousness unfinished, unmanaged, and now out of control.
An occasion when you heard the words or message that set you free,
a mouthpiece also misguided and interested only in themselves.
Just why are you so important?
Why is it that everyone and everything else pales in significance?
Is your hyper-individualism a genetic defect or a nightmarish quality that has infected our culture in which you were reared?
What has led you to believe that it is only about you?
It troubles me that you enter our neighborhood, that you come into our space.
As you are, you are not welcome.
Yes, you will wreak havoc someday.
The juggling of phone and beverage, the one-wheeled acrobatics, the disregard of signs ( STOP, CHILDREN AT PLAY, PEDESTRIAN CROSSING ) will be the demise or death of you or more importantly someone else.
You, what you are, how you behave will not be missed……we are better without you.
It is the poor soul who will be your victim that will be missed and mourned.
A tragedy that someone of value and importance should be sacrificed at your hands
II
For over three years you have proudly displayed that sign in front of your homes.
You are an educated people, professionals, parents, but somehow disconnected from what should follow those experiences and qualities.
It was Trump in 2016 and now Trump in 2020.
I think how can this be, where could this cultish fanaticism come from?
Trump the racist and bigot, you the educated professional,
Trump the adulterer, you the over the top family person,
Trump the pathological liar, you the model for growing children.
There is such a disconnect here, something beyond me that just does not add up.
I think about the dark corners of your mind,
what lurks in that space,
what is hidden from view,
what it is that you work so hard to keep under wraps.
Just what do you say to your children,
to the friends and colleagues who come to your home?
Is there no degree of embarrassment and shame?
Are you that far under his spell?
The fact that you exist is a disappointment to me.
The reality that you are so close, a never-ending annoyance.
We live in a mostly white neighborhood, from one end of the street to the other.
My suspicion is that there is pride in this,
in the fact that our purity remains intact.
We are a community of single family home owners, a goal that, historically and purposefully, has been unattainable by the majority of those “other” people.
Much work has gone into this; your laws, ordinances, unspoken policies, and downright underhanded behavior.
Yes, you say, climb out of poor neighborhoods, relocate, resettle,
just not where we live.
Find an apartment in a multi-family dwelling in someone else’s neighborhood.
We like the homogeneity, the rising property values, and our own lifestyle.
I go out of my way to be friendly to the one black family living on our street.
I want to say to them, hold your head high when you walk this street,
Be yourself, do your thing, ignore the stares that might be directed your way.
Sadly, they look so out of place.
This awkwardness, is that what they feel or is it just my issue?
If it is, I know where it comes from.
You can not live in this society as a white person and not be rooted in some degree of prejudice.
It is deep in our minds if not our hearts, placed there by generations who thought it okay.
Like others who have come to this horrible realization,
there is that daily fight to extinguish the demons or at least keep them buried behind a presumed enlightenment and hopefulness.
It is important to me that they feel welcome on my street.
And I sense that there are more who share in this desire.
I see the balancing signs that lives matter,
all are welcome in the their world and home.
So walk proudly, slowly.
Take your time to look not only at the Trump signs but the others as well.
Stroll down our street, take in the sterility and homogeneity that money can by.
Smile at those who may be looking at you from their porch or window.
Fight any discomfort that you may feel,
don’t give in to it or them.
Take comfort that there are increasingly beacons of hope on my street and others.
We will continue to greet you and welcome you and hope that change will come not just for you, but also in us.
People of all sorts walk this street.
It is not just the neighbors who are out there.
Others cross the unseen dividing line and enter.
This is a clean street, safe, with big handsome and pretty houses to look at.
Nicely kept yards offer a view that is only found in a few places in this city.
People of color although not living here, often walk by.
They seem to pay us no mind.
There is no acknowledgment that things are very different here.
I never sense that they walk and look with any kind of awe.
This may be a foreign turf, but it is never shown in their stride or how they hold their heads.
My read is that they could care less who we are or how we live.
Perhaps their thinking is that we can keep all of this,
too sterile, dull, and predictable.
A curiosity, not their dream,
a place to visit but not to reside……..too pretentious and overstated.
III
I wonder what you haul in that shiny new pick-up truck that so often speeds down my street.
Why is it that the bed of that fancy machine is most always empty?
No lumber, top soil, ladders or miscellaneous tools.
When you go by slow enough I can see that bed liner shine and sparkle.
I wonder what has happened to all of the signs of use and abuse.
Weren’t pick-up trucks created as utility vehicles to carry things and loads that a regular car could not.
For you, it appears to have been transformed into an image thing,
big, powerful, loud, and ready for anything.
Is that what you want to be,
how you want to be viewed by the world?
Wouldn’t Freud have great fun with this?
What would he say about the 4×4 insignia on all sides, the hemi engine, the oversized tires and flashy all black or chrome wheels?
Your psyche sitting so upright in the cab of that American macho machine.
Would you feel the same in a sedan, electric car, or god forbid, a four cylinder urban vehicle,
the higher gas mileage and ecological coolness enough to make you whole?
Perhaps it would be the lower insurance cost.
Think of the money saved and air quality afforded.
Would this not increase your self-esteem and confidence,
affirm that you are really okay in this world?
I jest, of course.
Sorry male pick-up driver, we know what this is really about.
I am just amazed that there are so many of you who pass by.
I smile that your claim to road share is quite often the middle,
that you have such a look of disregard on your face as you drive by.
So high up in you armored street vehicle, I guess it is easy to feel invulnerable.
Who or what is likely to hurt or threaten you in any vehicular encounter?
Again, four wheel drive, big block engine, those great tires,
would you even notice if something or someone should cross your path?
I try not to confuse you with the trades people who also frequent our street,
those who come to do our chores and make our repairs.
Real utility vehicles, honest intent, authentic.
No image issues here.
They seem to sit somewhat lower in the seat.
Name, telephone number, trade clearly showing on all sides of their vehicle.
And yes, rust, dirt, and signs of abuse.
You can spot the dings and dents from work encounters and accidents.
The bed liners, if they have one, scraped and rubbed raw by so much wear.
A certain character to this vehicle,
not meant to show off on the street or at the brushless car wash.
There is integrity in the grime,
a clear message that this vehicle has a genuine purpose,
Not an ego boosting, testosterone enhancing mega machine.
As they drive by, I acknowledge them.
When you pass, I think of the emptiness and insecurity that sits behind that wheel.
Yes, Freud would have great fun with this.
IV
Growing up I wondered how you lived up there.
A wannabe from midtown looking from afar.
You were inside the gates,
under the golden aura that I could see from my humble neighborhood.
At sixteen, I knew some of you who were here,
Joan, Peggy, Brian, Toby just to name a few.
You had it all going on, or so I imagined.
Crossing paths, distant encounters, you always seemed to be so untroubled,
not like me and my friends.
We were a ragged bunch who lived on the fringes and only wished we were inside those gates.
I remember your streets well, uptown, the part of town where the money was.
Your houses were so much bigger, your streets somehow better.
You had big green lawns and landscaping.
No one seemed down and out or just getting buy.
We were bunched together, a crowded lot of lower middle class folks with little to spare.
Simply put, we could not afford your streets and perhaps would not be welcomed if we could.
We went uptown for our entertainment.
The movie theater on Wall,
the hangout in front of Woolworths,
the pool halls,
the fireworks,
to play baseball,
to watch a football game,
and even to spend Halloween.
Did you have a special candy that drew everyone?
Why was this favorite night spent on your streets?
As teens, we went uptown to get drunk, attend parties, and, with luck, make-out.
Why was the flow always up, not down?
Did we not have anything to offer?
Was our diversity and how we lived, just a bit too much;
a deterrent in some weird way?
There had to be a reason, which I think we both now know.
It was you and your streets that I dreamed of,
where I really wanted to live,
the neighborhood I really wanted to say I was from.
Those uptown intersections, streets further up that mystical hill.
You were there, Joan, Peggy, Brian, and Toby.
Inside those gates, under that golden aura.
White collar, professional, destined, blue-blooded.
What more could one want.
Oh, the times I walked your streets thinking of what it would be like,
how my life would be different.
If things just had gone another way.
It is now over fifty years later and I am here,
arrived of sorts.
I have lived on those streets, climbed that mystical hill.
Inside now, under that glow with a full and very clear view of what life is like here.
Strangely, I don’t think much has changed.
Of course, Joan, Peggy, Brian, and Toby are long gone in there pursuit of higher gates and a brighter aura.
But the houses are here, pristine, big, and as isolated from the rest of this city.
Crossing a certain byway brings you into another world,
Uptown versus midtown, downtown and all that congers up.
Fifteen years now, on these streets.
I cross the dividing line most every day, but upon reentering no longer have that old rush.
Yes the gates are still here, but the fascination, at least for me, has passed.
In fact, it was always just a naïveté and misunderstanding on my part as to how things really were.
A pretentiousness here, an inflated sense of worth,
an immoral need to live within imaginary gates beyond the reach of anyone who might threaten their self-perceived status.
All this, that I now understand, really existed then and is still here.
Now new faces, new people, new wannabes.
A peculiar species we are, the ingrained need to see ourselves as better than others when at all possible.
I see with a clearer vision these days.
You on this street.
Your street,
now mine only in memory and past dreams.
I am over you and gladly welcome the changing face of this old byway.
Past wannabes gone,
I enjoy my time watching as you pass by.
I smile at your struggle to hang on,
your recoil in response to the changes that now come at you.
Your gates more porous than they have ever been,
your aura faded and pale, no longer hiding a sad truth.
I know now what has always been the reality of this street.
How do I fit in to all of this?
I am white and have a comfortable amount of money,
otherwise, I am an outlier.
Some adolescent dynamic, never resolved, got me here.
Remember the dream was uptown, not where I was.
Something so old, that powerful a motivator.
An irrational drive, a fateful misunderstanding.
Here now, comfortable in some ways and very dissatisfied in others.
Entrenched, detached.
Trapped but curious.
Excited about the changes,
welcoming new, fresh faces, the dynamic energy, the eclecticism versus the sameness.
The feeling of being on the threshold of something so robust and different.
The appeal to sit on my wall, watch, and write,
feeling reinvigorated and young again.